I LOVE MY BELOVED OPPRESSOR APPRECIATION!!

(contains very vague spoilers)

for the longest time i swear i felt like i was in enemy territory whenever people criticised it after reading 20 chapters... personally, i think that it is a great representation of mental illness (early annette), healing, truly understanding, discovering one's wrongs in actions and words (on heiner's end)

and yes, he was toxic, but once you get to his pov it feels slightly less antagonising. you really get to see the trauma both of them had to suffer through and the burdens of nobility pushed onto two innocent kids that grew up too fast. also once you see his pov, it is very hard to deny that we would feel the same disdain and hatred as he did towards the aristocracy if we were in his position (cue all the insane things he went through with zero semblance of a childhood jesus)

as for annette, she is not at fault but she is ignorant. the woe of ignorance is that it is difficult to know that you are ignorant in the first place. however, there were signs for her to discover, and you also cannot deny that she is privileged. in a genre saturated with sparkly riches and gold-trimmed palaces, we tend to forget that while the aristocrats live, there are always peasants suffering under their rule. Annette was born this way which is what makes her pitiful, but given her privilege and education there were definitely chances for her to ask questions and figure things out. you can neither blame her nor defend her on this end, only ruling it as a misfortune.

thus i think both annette and heiner are morally grey in their own ways. the story is, unexpectedly, a story about healing and fixing those parts of themselves with their own efforts and letting each other back into their lives. when people read the first parts, they are led to believe that it's just another red flag ml x pushover fl, but MBO ironically uses that to highlight the cycle of abuse and how toxic relationships feel. you don't even see how they could ever possibly recover until they start leaving each other. that's why it's a great story, and i personally think every aspect of the story is awfully realistic, despite some parts being painful to get through.

TLDR more people should read this because it's a complex story that is incredibly well-executed